Thursday Night

Picture from Millstone, New Jersey, where they are cleaning up after over half a foot of snow. Check out the satellite loop and you can see the low clouds now covering much of West Michigan. The sun is low in the sky at this time of year and it’ll be tough to warm the air enough to mix the moist air where the clouds are with drier air (causing the clouds to dissipate). Light wind across the area is also a factor. I’m starting to look thru data at home, like I usually do on work days. We have Cristina, our exchange student from 10 years ago, staying with us this week. She is from Spain. As you know, the “statism on steroids” and overspending has wreaked havoc on the economy of Spain, where the unemployment rate is currently 25.1% (and other European countries – Greece, Ireland, Portugal – in Greece, the unemployment rate is 25% and another +25% work for the government – they have a retirement age of 55 – there isn’t enough wealth being generated to pay for everything….Germany’s retirement age is 67). Cristina graduated with a degree in architecture and had to look outside her native country for work. She now works in Switzerland and will probably live there forever. Back to weather, the morning run of the NAM (Caribou) gives G.R. 0.07″ of rain Friday evening, with high temperatures in the mid 50s tomorrow and low-mid 60s Saturday and Sunday. Tomorrow will be the first day in half a month with a high temperature warmer than average. After the 2nd warmest July ever in G.R., temperatures have been slightly cooler than average since August 1.

ACK! I was just playing on Wundergrounds model maps for Saturday around noon-ish; the GFS shows a slug of rain over Baldwin (where we hope to paddle) and the Euro shows it dry. Not that rain necessarily stops us – but with each forecast discussion, the word *thunder* get ominously added. We won’t paddle in a storm

4 major storms in the NE in the past 2 years: Irene, Snowtober, Sandy, and now Athena…This is very unusual and unprecedented for 4 major storms to strike the NE U.S. in 2 yrs. Hopefully this is not the new normal as many climatologists are pointing out that is could be!

If “global warming” brings “cooling air temperatures”, then why do we need “skyrocketing utility rates” and “European level gasoline prices”?

Actually, I have argued for 20 years that if there is global warming, whether natural or man-caused, then the Poles will warm faster than the tropics (the tropics are BIG compared to the Poles…and the tropics are mostly water, which is slow to warm and cool). Therefore, the temperature gradient from the Poles to the Equator will be SMALLER, not larger. If that were to happen, then it would be a reasonable argument that storms would be weaker and not stronger. But weaker storms doesn’t fit the political paradigm. Talk of “Super Hurricanes” and “Monster Tornadoes” will get them to go for higher taxes. Hurricanes are a mechanism for transferring heat from the Tropics toward the Poles. Note how the ACE Index (Accumulated Tropical Cyclone Energy) has dropped to very (historic) low levels after peaking in 2005: http://policlimate.com/tropical/global_running_pdi.png

“Therefore, the temperature gradient from the Poles to the Equator will be SMALLER, not larger. If that were to happen, then it would be a reasonable argument that storms would be weaker and not stronger.”

“Talk of ‘Super Hurricanes’ and ‘Monster Tornadoes’ will get them to go for higher taxes.”

Yes! Yes! Any scientist worth his/her salt will be skeptical about the effects on storm frequency/strength, since they are buried beneath layers of complexity. Also, tropical cyclones, midlatitude cyclones, and mesoscale storms are all different creatures. Here are a couple other things to ponder:

How would thermodynamic profiles change? Would lapse rates be steeper or not?

How would kinematic profiles change? If shear is lower, how would this decrease the frequency/intensity of severe weather? How would this increase the frequency/intensity of tropical cyclones?

Is the hemispheric circulation likely to become more zonal or meridional, on average? How would the average wave number change?

What about the size of tropical cyclones? How might that change, if at all?

So much research left to go on the MJO and QBO! How will those be affected and how will they in turn affect other processes?

“Hurricanes are a mechanism for transferring heat from the Tropics toward the Poles.”

Right, but they don’t exist for the sake of the poles. They don’t care if it’s cold or warm over the poles. All they want is a disturbance either from an easterly wave or the southern tip of a lingering cold front, warm oceans, low shear, and just a dash of Coriolis. Assuming easterly waves or baroclinic sources wouldn’t change somehow in a warmer climate (and they likely would), tropical cyclones should still want to exist as much as they do now even if the poles are warmer.

Speaking of heat transfer from the tropics to the poles, ocean currents do more to transfer this heat than tropical cyclones do. How will those change? How will that feed back on the atmosphere? How will the atmosphere feed back on ocean currents?

The non-linearity of it all! It boggles the mind, and without the use of sound physics equations and powerful computers, I don’t much care for a bunch of politicians arguing for either side of the issue. And I don’t want to trust any scientist that has political motivations. But oh how easy it is for them to be intertwined: no funding, no science.

Another thing to ponder, if midlatitude cyclones are less frequent or less intense, your moisture advection across the continent may change too! What would this mean for the rainfall that would be received in the middle of the continent? How much more or less precip would they see from conveyor belt rains, and how much much more or less precip would they see from convection? What about these questions for each of the seasons? More/less frequent or intense drought? More/less frequent or intense floods? So many things to consider!

But I wouldn’t know. Nowcasting and short-to-medium term forecasting is more my thing…